Those Kids Across the Street are Crazy
by KibaKibbles
Summary: Connor and I didn't expect to find much in that abandoned warehouse across the street, but trust me when we say - avoid it all cost! Those kids are crazy. *Begins a month or so before Serpent's Shadow*
1. Chapter 1

**Summary: Travis and Connor Stoll live across the street from an abandoned warehouse in Brooklyn. They thought it was abandoned, but actually some really weird kids live there. **

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**T**he people living in that warehouse across the street are crazy. And considering how strange we are, being demigod sons of the god of Thieves, we know crazy. Before I thought crazy was when Connor and I managed to create a giant igloo covering our house using over a thousand rolls of toilet paper, or the time I was in a "high speed" police chase on my cousin Tom's mini-scooter – which by the way can only go as fast as 10 mph. All of that pales to the strange stuff happening at the supposedly abandoned warehouse.

In our empty neighborhood the warehouse was one of those places we'd tried to conquer. We could only imagine all the trouble we could cause in there. It was strange though, every time we got close to it something urgent popped up that made us have to leave, I shudder just thinking about the bout of explosive diarrhea that occurred after stepping through the gate one time.

So when we were visiting mom during winter and heard a loud explosion in the middle of the night, we assumed it was some random arsonist. It's disheartening to say that the police and our mother blamed us right away. After returning/being forced back to camp we forgot about it, especially after hearing about strange stuff happening all over the states. It wasn't until we visited mom in the spring that we found the previously destroyed warehouse completely intact. How mom didn't remember the explosion was also pretty strange.

It was during those days visiting mom that we noticed the lack of abandonment. At first with random bangs occurring, we thought a few bums were camping out. Then we heard shouts and laughter, and one day we saw kids coming out from it. A group of them were carrying large candy cane looking things.

After that Connor and I made it our mission to find out what was going on. We decided to stake out the place at night while mom was asleep. Like ninjas we walked to the limestone building, well maybe not like ninjas – we pretty much woke up all the neighborhood dogs that began howling. This time we were determined, nothing would make us leave – our top goal was getting inside. For good measure we hadn't eaten all day.

We passed the gate, I suddenly remembered I'd forgotten to call Katie and Connor realized he'd forgotten to turn off the stove.

_Focus._ We reminded each other and pressed on, Katie would have to yell at me later, and hopefully the house wouldn't burn down. The warehouse was creepy at night, it loomed dauntingly high, and the bars over the windows gleamed menacingly.

When we walked up the steps we were dismayed to find the handle missing on the wooden door. Looking around for another entrance also deemed useless. In the end we decided to try and knock the door down. Throwing our shoulders into it while shoving hard proved useless, it was like a giant unmoving boulder.

Just as we were giving up and heading home the door opened slowly. We looked up at the door from the bottom of the steps, anxious to see who it was.

Squawk!

A penguin waddled out slowly, followed by another, and another. It was literally a march of the penguins.

SQUAWK!

"Come back! Come back!" a young boy with dark hair flew out the building, chasing after the marching penguins. "It's okay, I won't let Philip eat you!"

I was about to ask the kid what was going on, when a giant, scary, large, intimidating, albino crocodile flew out the door after the marching penguins and boy. I'm embarrassed to reveal that my pants were a bit damp after that.

"Stop! Don't eat the penguins Phillip!" A dark skinned boy with dark curly hair, a blonde haired girl, and others exited quickly from the doorway, all chasing after the marching penguins, the boy, and the impossibly large albino crocodile.

And if that wasn't strange enough a baboon wearing an L.A. Lakers basketball jersey ran out the door. At this point Connor and I were confused, scared, and curious at the same time. I'd thought finding out my dad's Hermes, the actual god, would be the high point of weird stuff – but this topped it all.

The craziness continued as an old man dressed in only a loin cloth skipped out the door, "Zeebras! Weasels! Coooooookieees!" The old man sprinkled us with cookie crumbs and gave us a toothless grin.

A small girl, no older than five, exited next. She, besides the loony dancing old man, was the only one to acknowledge our prescence. She didn't look shocked at what was happening, instead she approached Connor and I and waved her small hand up to us, "There's nothing goin' on here, go home."

Her jedi mind powers worked, Connor and I exchanged looks of befuddlement and left the warehouse. Ignoring the penguins, crocodile, and dancing old man. The next day after getting some much needed sleep we agreed to avoid the place. Our lives are crazy enough.

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**Author's Note:** I dunno if lots of people would want to read a continuation of this but please tell me, so I know if I should! I never ask for this, but if 5 people say they want more I'll write another chapter. :D


	2. Chapter 2

**I** held Katie's hand as we walked from 7-11 to my house. We had been dating for a short while, though on Facebook we are listed "It's Complicated," due to all the times we find ourselves in competition or her yelling at me for one of my pranks, resulting in us breaking up for a while.

We passed the limestone warehouse, the dreadful place that Connor and I vowed to never visit again. Katie, surprisingly took interest in it.

"What's that building," she asked curiously.

My palms instantly became sweaty as I quickly glanced at that strange place with enormous crocodiles and dancing toothless old men. "Nothing – I mean, let's just go home."

Katie stopped and gave me a smirk, "Oh wow a place Travis Stoll, the great fearless prankster, doesn't want to visit. It must be amazing, let's go." She turned towards it and began to walk in that direction.

My mouth gaped open as she pulled me towards it, "Oh sweet baby Cupid, we're going to be eaten."

"What?" she asked.

I shook my head, Katie was leading us to our doom. We approached the gates and suddenly I felt the urge to steal a car. Katie muttered something about how she needed to make sure one of her sisters is keeping the cabin clean. But she opened the gate and we walked inside the open courtyard.

So far it was empty and nothing unusual was going on. Then the front door opened slowly. "Oh gods! Not the penguins!" I couldn't help but shriek aloud, Katie gave me a puzzled look. A group of kids crowded outside the door, I recognized a lot of them from the previous night but now there were more. They didn't notice us, and for that I was glad until Katie had to scream out to them.

"Hey!" She screamed, "My friend here is your neighbor, we were just in the neighborhood."

The group gave us startled looks before they started talking amongst themselves. I overheard them say,_ "-act normal"_ and, _"-don't look suspicious." _ Then smiling creepily they looked back at us.

A teen girl with curly brown hair approached us, with the same forced smile as the others. "It's nice to meet you, I guess we are your neighbors," she had a slight accent.

"That's nice, my friend –erm boyfriend, Travis here, lives across the street. It's funny because I swear he's scared of this place," Katie laughed sweetly, unfazed by the tension in the air.

"I'm Cleo," she said before twisting her head to gaze up at me. Her creepy smile spread wider, "There's nothing scary here at all."

"No, extremely large Crocodiles?" I asked cautiously.

Cleo shook her head and gave a sharp laugh, "Of course not." I knew she was lying. "Well the masters of the house are currently not here, but we were going to have a picnic in the park."

Katie giggled, and I wanted to pull her back to my house away from the strange people who reminded me of the kids from the movie The Others. "That's great, we were about to go eat some snacks we just bought. Do you mind if we come with you?"

"Erm – let me ask the others," she said apprehensively before scurrying back to the weirdos.

The last thing I wanted was to eat lunch with them, but Katy had a tendency to look past the bad in people – I guess that's why she fell for me.

_"They can't!"_ – _"What if we-"_ – _"Then don't blow them up!"_

I gasped at the last part I overheard. Obviously these kids were part of some terrorist organization. "Katie, let's eat at my house. I have a bad feeling about all this."

Katie laughed, "No way, they seem nice enough." Sometimes I swear that girl does things to bother me on purpose.

The group descended down the stairs, giving us cautious looks but at least they were no longer smiling awkwardly at us.

"Is that a baboon?" Katie pointed at the giant monkey I'd seen the previous night. It was still wearing an LA Lakers jersey.

"Don't worry, Khufu doesn't hurt anyone," Cleo motioned for the baboon to hold her hand. It looked up at me and gave me a sharp-toothy grin. Besides the teeth, up-close the monkey didn't look so scary, it looked a bit goofy. "Unless he's upset, of course. Then he's a little monster." I would make sure to keep my fingers away.

We walked outside of the warehouse grounds, casually chatting along the way. Most of the older kids ignored us, but the younger ones including the little girl I saw last night, chatted up a storm. They told us that they were a boarding school – although I didn't understand why they'd set up in that old warehouse. But as I talked to them I realized maybe I had been wrong, and last night was just a freaky hallucination. Sure we must've seen a baboon, but perhaps the Mist had malfunctioned and made us see all those other things.

The small park was just a few blocks from my house and it was relatively empty, only a bum lay snoring on the park bench. The school kids and teens spread out blankets and took out baskets. I sat between Katie and Khufu the baboon.

"See this is nice," Katie whispered to me.

I nodded, "Guess I was wrong." I should've knocked on wood after saying that, I jinxed us all and perhaps incited the craziness that was about to begin.

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**Author's Note:** And this has turned into a chapter fic. It's not going to be long. It's just a short comedy, but thanks for the reviews and wanting me to continue. ^_^ I'll post more tomorrow or so.


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: I made a mistake last chapter. I said the events of the first chapter happened the previous day, but after the first chapter there was a time skip and currently the events of Serpent's Shadow have already happened. (So spoiler warning for Serepent's Shadow!)**

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**I** began to munch on one of my tacos, Katie ate her usual favorite cereal. The others passed out plates amongst themselves. Little Shelby offered me one and threatened me with a crayon when I tried to refuse.

"Aw man, who let Khufu pack the lunch?" the boy I recognized as the Penguin chaser asked. Groans erupted from the group.

"Great, who wants Cheetos and mango Jell-O?" More groans erupted from the group.

"Khufu, why did you pack Oregano?" Cleo asked as she held up a bag of herbs.

Katie taped my shoulder and whispered in my ear, "Do you think we should share our food?" At the word share the eyes of everyone else turned to us. I tried covering my bunch of tacos, earning me some really pathetic doe eyes and quivering lips.

"Fine!" I gave up, mainly because Katie was giving me her stink-eye and I'll admit at least the kindergartners looked kinda cute with their sad puppy dog eyes.

I had packed a huge lunch – a growing demi god's gotta eat! So after distributing my tacos and Katie passed around some granola bars I only had one left. Just as I was about to take a bite a hairy hand appeared in my face. Khufu was gazing at my taco intently.

"No way monkey dude, this is my last taco," the baboon didn't move, "No – taco – for – you." I restated hoping he'd understand.

Khufu made a loud grunt and moved his hand closer to me like a begging toddler.

"What should I do?" I asked Katie.

"Just give it to him," she replied. But I had stolen those tacos fair and square – well maybe not the fair part.

"No way. Besides it's not healthy for a baboon to eat human food, right?" Katie shrugged. "Go away baboon. Eat your leaves." In hindsight, I probably shouldn't have said that and I definitely shouldn't have plopped the whole taco in my mouth right in front of him.

Khufu lost it. I'd never seen a baboon throw a temper tantrum, and I definitely wouldn't want to again. He shrieked loudly and flailed his arms madly. Throwing around Katie's granola bars and my Cola. His lips were drawn back revealing his incredibly sharp canines.

"It's okay Khufu, we'll get you more tacos later," Cleo tried to reason. But I suspect Khufu's pride was hurt more than the fact that I'd eaten that delicious taco.

Khufu continued his tirade, I pulled Katie away from the angered baboon and held her behind me. Khufu threw the other's plates around and continued shrieking wile Cleo tried to sing a song to calm him down.

"Bad Kung-Foo," Shelby approached the baboon with her crayon in hand, as I reached to pull her out of Khufu's way the crayon emitted a large blast of energy. "Bad Kung-Foo, bad!" She continued after Khufu who realized he'd rather not die over a taco and try to avoid the powerful weapon that was a "Wild Strawberry Crayola Crayon."

"Is that a crayon?" Katie screamed over the blasts and yells of the others trying to get Shelby to stop.

"Let's get outta here," I yelled. But before we could escape a flock of penguins began to march around. Flashbacks of that incident popped up in my mind. "No, please not the penguins!"

"Did you just have to summon penguins now Felix?" Cleo yelled. She looked close to tears as she along with a few older kids tried to gain control of the situation.

I grabbed Katie's hand and bolted towards the entrance of the park. The bum who was sleeping on the park bench earlier was awake now and grinning at the whole event as if it were the coolest thing he'd ever seen.

_FREEEK! _

I looked up towards the sky only to see a giant boat being towed by a giant winged lion. It was at that moment that I realized the group of kids were far from normal mortals.

The lion thing FREEEKed again and swooped fast to the ground. I could make out a few figures on the boat looking probably as horrified as I did.

"No Freak!" one of them yelled just as the lion-bird swooped down and grabbed a penguin in its mouth.

"MY PENGUIN!" Felix wailed, he threw his hands up to the sky and screamed at the lion who was flying higher in the sky.

The lion must've finished its snack quickly because it descended again, this time aiming for me and Katie. Thankfully our demigod reflexes came in handy and we easily dodged it. The lion-bird not wanting to miss out on food grabbed another penguin much to Felix's horror.

"NOOOOOO!" the teary boy yelled.

"Katie can you stop it?" I asked her quickly as the lion ascended into the sky again. Katie nodded. "Good, I'll be the bait." Before Katie could stop me I dashed off towards where the lion was descending again. I didn't have time to think about my plan, I'm more of a reaction kind of guy. But I just knew I had to keep Katie safe – and if we did manage to get out of this maybe I'd even get a nice reward.

Grinning stupidly as perverted ideas ran through my mind I shouted out to the flying lion, "Over here! Common, I bet I taste better than a penguin!"

The lion licked its lips as if it agreed and dove after me. "Now Katie!" I yelled, hoping she'd use some of her inherited powers to stop it, however nothing happened. "Well this was a bad idea."

I could feel the lion's hot breath on my face and closed my eyes in preparation for my painful death. Then I heard a whooshing noise fly past my ear. I opened my eyes quickly to see a gigantic dandelion wrap around the lion's neck, pulling it back like a leash. I let out a breath of relief as the lion came to a halting stop.

"Thought you were going to let me be eaten," I muttered to Katie.

"Sorry," she said, her face was flushed. "There's too much grass around here, I couldn't find anything to help." I hugged her weakly, now feeling drained after such a large adrenaline rush. But at least we were alive.

Which reminded me. Why was there a flying lion? It didn't look like any Greek monsters I knew of, not that I really paid attention during lessons at camp.

"Well that was interesting," a blonde haired girl stepped out of the boat carefully and approached the lion who was looking quite guilty and full – its belly was bulging a bit from its penguin dinner. Two boys stepped out of the wreckage next, both looked a bit shaken up.

"Bad Lion, Bad!" Shelby scolded the restrained beast, her laser crayon was in her chubby hand. Cleo, who had Khufu's furry paw in one hand grabbed Cleo before she could blast the lion away.

"Who are you two?" The curly haired dark skinned boy asked us accusingly. As if we were somehow responsible for almost getting eaten by a gigantic lion.

"I'm Connor, this is Katie – I'm your neighbor. And your lion thing almost ate us!"

The teen ran his hand through his hair nervously, "Yeah, sorry about that. He's not good with strangers."

The other teen who was a lot buffer and taller approached us. He had a stern look on his face and I had a bad feeling. "You shouldn't be here," he stated matter-of-factly . "Both of you shouldn't be here."

Well excuse us, I didn't want to be there in the first place. Just as I was about to yell at the guy the blonde haired girl spoke up.

"Leave them alone Walt, it's not their fault for almost being eaten. I told Carter to train this thing if he's going to keep it as a pet. But the poor boy doesn't listen to reason." The curly haired boy who I took as Carter rolled his eyes.

Walt was still gazing intently at Katie and I, giving me a serious case of the creeps. He reminded me of Nico Di'Angelo, dark and brooding with strange eyes. Plus he reeked of death.

"You smell like dead bodies," I muttered aloud, curse my ADD!

"Oh my gods Travis, you can't just tell someone they smell like dead bodies," Katie scolded. "Sorry about him, I'm still teaching him manners."

"Well, I guess we should get going," I stated, hoping to leave before the buff dude could damage my face.

"We can't let you leave," Walt stated, though it was strange because it sounded like his voice was echoing.

"We can't?" the blonde girl asked.

"We can't?" Katie and I asked.

"What's up Walt?" Carter asked.

"They're too dangerous, we definitely can't let them leave. I'll explain it later, trust me."

"Wait, we're dangerous? Says the people who keep that as a pet?" I pointed to the still tied up lion bird who was staring intently at the remaining penguins

"Yay! My first kidnapping!" A guy shouted.

"We're not kidnapping anyone Julian," Carter stated forcefully, "They're just coming with us because they have no other choice.

Because that's not the definition of kidnapping, I thought as they proceeded to tie us up with twine.


	4. Chapter 4

"**W**alt told us everything, about what you people are."

"Well, what are we?" I asked, struggling with the itchy twine that held my wrists.

"Vampires."

"What? !" I had no idea what she was going on about.

"Sorry, thought I'd lighten the mood," Sadie grinned.

She'd have to do much more to lighten the mood, like maybe releasing us. Katie and I had been forcefully tied up and brought to the large warehouse – which had actually turned out to be a pretty cool mansion in the inside. There were large screen TVs, creepy looking statues and tons of food. But then we'd been thrown in a closet, so much for hospitality. I'd guess we'd been locked up for a few hours.

"You're Greek demigods though," she stated. At this point I would've been shocked for them to find out, but considering how crazy those people were I figured to just accept it.

"Yeah, can we go now?" I asked tiredly, nothing Katie or I did seemed to loosen the twine's hold, in fact the more we struggled the tighter it got. A fact Katie had made fun of me for ignoring. I was pretty sure any longer and I'd lose my hands.

"Not just yet," she gave us a half grin, "After all you are supposed to be our enemies. And who knows what you'd do if you told those others where are headquarters are."

"We won't tell," Katie exclaimed.

"Yeah, and what are you going to do, keep us tied in here forever?"

Sadie acted like she was actually thinking about which put me in panic mode, "I promise we won't just let us go! Besides what do you mean we're enemies?"

"You haven't figured it out yet? All the statues you saw and paintings didn't tip you off?"

Um, no I hadn't. And from the look Katie was giving her, neither had she.

"Well we are still discussing the situation," Sadie remarked. She started heading out of the closet, "Just a few more hours I suppose."

"Wait!" I yelled. This was illegal. But the blonde girl left and closed the door behind her. Luckily she left the light on this time.

"Katie," I muttered angrily, "We're getting out of here." I fumbled around my pocket and took out a drachma. First they needed water to create a rainbow. "Start spitting."


	5. Chapter 5

**G**ood news was that we managed to spit a big enough puddle to message Connor, bad news was we were stuck with a spreading puddle of our own spit in a cramped closet.

"We'll get out of this soon, Connor should be here any minute," I reassured Katie. She was surprisingly being a pretty good sport, I'd expected her to complain a bit more or maybe collapse into sobs.

"I should've listened to you Travis. Those kids are crazy," She said in a husky quiet voice.

My eyes widened, she'd never agreed with me before. Heck, I don't think anyone's done that before, most times people say "I should'nt have trusted you!" or, "I told you I shouldn't have eaten it!"

"Well, I have my moments," I grinned smugly. Her blue eyes looked up at me and my stomach did a flip. I suddenly realized I'd been trapped in a closet facing my very attractive girlfriend, and hadn't done anything. Leaning in closer to her face to give her a different kind of comfort, our lips were about to touch when the next series of events happened!

Not that I wasn't happy that we were being saved, it's just out of the hours we'd been captured, they had to come right as I was about to taste her sweet supple lips that just begged to be kissed – but I digress…

"We're being attacked!" Someone screamed from outside of the closet. I heard bangs and clanks before a lot of screaming.

"Connor sure is putting up a fight," I remarked. Katie nodded. I grew fidgety at the idea of being free soon.

Then the door opened, I was surprised to see my half brother Chris Rodriguez and his terrifying girlfriend Clarisse.

"Hey losers," Clarisse said with a menacing grin, "Looks like you've started a war."

After we were untied I saw what she meant. My friends and family had swords out as they battled against our kidnappers, who were putting up a good fight. Balls of energy and giant images of cats were being used by them against the demigods. Yup, they're definitely crazy.

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**AN:** hehe, sorry if I'm cruel. But I was waiting for more reviews before I updated... :) hehe so sorry.

But Travis and Katie are finally free. The battle of the Greeks and Egyptians has begun!


	6. Chapter 6

**I**t seemed like everyone from camp was here – minus Percy, Annabeth and those new kids. And from the way they were fighting I think most of them were just glad to be a part of some action.

"Destroy them!" Aaron, a son of Ares shouted right as he punched a tall guy in his gut.

The demigods roared and pressed on. My crazy kidnappers definitely were overwhelmed. Not to say they weren't putting up a good fight, but they were outnumbered by the kids of the gods. As I watched the battle I even started to feel a twinge in my gut. Perhaps, maybe they'd learned their lesson.

And then little Shelby pulled out her crayon and nearly blasted me to death. "Get them!" I yelled.

We continued on in our attack, soon we had most of them cornered. That was when the very large albino alligator decided to make a visit.

"Is that a crocodile?" I heard someone ask. My friends looked confused as they probably questioned why such a creature would be found inside a warehouse in Brooklyn.

"Destroy it too!" Clarisse yelled before prodding it with her electric spear.

A giant cat's paw swiped at Clarisse, knocking her to the ground. Pleased, the enemies changed from defense to assault.

"They're magicians!" said a kid of Hectate. That would probably explain a lot, but did that mean they were Greek. Our weapons did injure them. After all the secrets our parents kept from us, perhaps there was another hidden camp for demigods.

The battle continued on, and soon I began to feel exhausted. This was going nowhere.

"Give up!" Yelled Carter.

"You give up!" Shouted Clarisse, before electrocuting some random guy.

"No, you give up!" Exclaimed one of the enemies as he threw a fireball, hitting Castor's head.

"No, you give up!" Connor yelled before throwing greek fire at the boy.

"No! You get up!" Screamed little Shelby as she aimed her crayon at an unsuspecting Will Solace.

I knew I had to do something as both groups shouted at each other to give up. If I'd learned anything at camp, it is that the Greeks never give up – except for that time the Romans defeated them, and that other time during WW2, and that other time… Anyways, at least I knew they weren't going to give up.

"SHUDDUP!" I exclaimed, throwing greek fire down at my feet for emphasis. It burned a little. "Everyone, stop. I know they kidnapped Katie and I but obviously we can't just stay here all day. What if we're on the same team and we don't even know it. Like when we found out about the Romans."

"There are Romans too?" Sadie asked.

Maybe I shouldn't have said that aloud, "Um, maybe. But what if this was all a misunderstanding."

"Dude, we're Egyptians. Your Greeks, trust us this isn't a misunderstaing," said the boy who'd set Castor's hair aflame.

"Egyptians?" I questioned. I guess all the Egyptian statues and hieroglyphics were a hint.

"Duh," he replied.

"Julian, enough," Carter said to the guy before turning his attention to us, "Anyways, yeah we're Egyptians. We just found out about you guys too. We weren't going to hurt those two –"

"Really? You only kept us tied up for hours in a closet. Nothing threatening about that," I interrupted. Although I wanted the fighting to stop, I wasn't about to let them brush off our kidnapping as if it were some little event.

"Told you that was a bad idea Anubis-Walt – whatever!" Carter said angrily to the creepy dark skinned dude.

"We couldn't trust you, Greeks have a tendency to play coy and then invade an entire country," said Walt.

"We don't do that!" Connor said, adding weakly, "Anymore…"

"Sorry we tied you up then," Carter said sheepishly, running a hand through his curly hair.

"Our bad?" Sadie added weakly.

And after that we had a nice long chat. We talked about mythology and about the gods and all the crazy adventures they made us get into. We had tea and munched on crumpets and then sang songs before dancing around a campfire with a baboon and a giant crocodile.

Oh who am I kidding, of course Clarisse didn't accept their apology. Instead she made a declaration.

"Tomorrow at 7 we will be back, you better prepare this time."

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**Thanks for reviewing! I'll be honest, I dunno where this story is going. Lol. None of this was planned. So I can't wait to find out what I write next. Enjoy!**


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